The year was 1966. April, 1966...... M. was pregnant and due this month, so said the gods at Long Island Jewish Hospital. I was called into the personnel office to be interviewed for a new job. In the meeting was the VP of Operations for North America. I was briefed on the subject of SAS being granted the landing rights into Seattle, WA. and would this be of interest to me. The job was said to be one that could eventually lead to bigger and better jobs. My reply was simple, could I talk this over with my wife and I promised to get back with my reply within 2 days. As I left the building on my way back to JFK, thoughts ran rapid through my brain, how would I tell my parents, that I was picking up their only grandchild, even though not born yet, and moving 3000 miles to the other side of the country. More importantly, will M. want to go? I called Margot from the airport and told her what the meeting was about and I could immediately hear in her voice........YES!!!!!. BUT LET ME do some research on the city. That evening we talked about it at length and we both decided that this could possibly be very good for us. By that time Margot had done some checking and had found that Seattle was a small city of less than a million people located on the shores of Puget Sound, a warm water inlet fed by the Japanese current. WHAAA? OH YAH, I remember being there for the worlds fair in 1962. Well, without waiting the 2 days I had promised, the very next day I told the VP I was interested. Only one more thing to do......there were several other applicants and they had to check all of them out. The following week, I was brought back into the Queens Bldg head office and advised that I had been selected. I should make all the arrangements for the move and since SAS was paying for the total move, I was to coordinate this with the Manager of Personnel. My date that I was to be in Seattle was just given as July 1966 and we had to more or less be up and running for the inaugural flight on Sept 2,1966.
Well, Lisa arrived in April, as planned. A beautiful little bundle, so dependent on whatever decisions we made, ( that, by the way, changed a few years later......another story, another day). Margot and I started planning for our move and tried to include my parents as much as possible, so they didn't feel that they were totally being pushed out of our lives....that in itself was one big chore. My parents, especially my mother, understood the importance it meant to our lives but....but...but her granddaughter, how would she take it. Mom, the kid is 2 months old, she sleeps, eats, and leaves the remains in a piece of cloth wrapped around her bottom. She'll never know, until it's to late. At any rate, Margot and I agreed that since we would have no place to live, it was best for her and Lisa to go to Sweden, when I left and I would contact them and arrange transportation to Seattle, when I had picked out a house. SSSOOOOO....In July, the two of them were off to Sweden and I was off to Seattle. That year saw a tremendous strike including about 7 airlines and my trip to Seattle was quite interesting. I remember having to fly to Montreal, Canada, getting permission from Lufthansa German Airlines and the Canadian Government to board a flight destined for San Francisco, CA. reason being that Lufthansa had no traffic rights to board passengers in Canada to fly to the United States. Under the circumstances, permission granted. In San Francisco I transferred over to Western Airlines, one of the few carriers not on strike. Finally, Seattle was in my sites.
Arriving Seattle was indeed culture shock coming form the Big Apple. The terminal was so small .....home to only 7 airlines..........the airport police all dressed like "Smokey the Bear" guys with boy scout hats, parking was limited to any car that could park outside the front doors of the main terminal, including not only passengers but employees, which on one hand was good for me, since I hated to walk but on the other hand bad for the passengers with a lot of baggage. There was a separate level for arrival and departures, as there is today, but in mini size. Two restaurants, a very expensive one (for those days) and a coffee shop. It did have an employees cafeteria, but I think the food was made in the coffee shop and sent downstairs to the employees restaurant, so it took some time to get hot food. Later they put in a grill etc so hot food could be made downstairs.
The first day in Seattle, I checked in with the airport authority to find out where the SAS ticket counter was going to be. I was shown the area and was happy to see it was at the end side of the building, first airline counter you would come to. Also found out from one of the Police officers, I became friendly with, that there was a minor shoot out with a person about a month before right at the sight of the ticket counter. OOHHH!!!! crap, do you think this guy will come back just for revenge?? I was assured by Officer Montana, a 6'6" black (politically correct for that year) guy built like a 380 lb. New York Giant lineman , that was not an option , that person will not come back. Wonder what he meant by that??
Several things I noticed the first weeks in Seattle. One....there was some kind of law....I think they called it the blue law, whereby you could not purchase any alcoholic beverages on the week-ends. This forced us to pool whatever money we had on Friday to run across the street from the airport and buy a couple of cases of beer. They also covered up the meat cases with white sheets and you could not buy fresh meat. So you either bought packaged cold cuts or only ate vegetables for the week end. Well, no big thing.........until Margot arrived, then we needed meat for her Swedish meatballs.
Two... I never heard a auto horn, which made me suspicious to the fact that either I was loosing my hearing or the people just were not able to locate the horns on the cars. As a matter of fact. I was reading a map one time sitting at the red light. The light actually turned green twice and the guy in back of me just kept sitting there. He did come over after that and tell me it was OK for me to go on green.........but in a very courteous way.............Now, if that was New York, I would have been wearing his hood ornament up my butt. To this day, horn blowing, is kept to.00001%. Either it's a young kid that doesn't know better or some old crazy, that just made a mistake. Those people usually keep waving to you for 2 minutes, it's their way of apologizing for waking you up. Have you ever noticed how they now have on the new cars a little raised picture of a horn on the steering wheel ? Is that used for braille????
Three, people were very layed back. In New York I would go into a barber shop for a haircut. It was a shop that played a lot of Spanish music, the barbers were trained to cut hair to that music, so I usually left with my new haircut within 6 minutes and the word cha cha cha cut out of my hair. Here, though, they sat me in a chair told me all about what they had for dinner the night before along with the weather forecast for the next 10 days and I left 30 minutes later and I didn't even have the words cha cha cha carved out of the side of my head.
Last but not least everyone, including the checkout girl at the local Safeway were always so polite. I would stop on the way home from work to pick up a quart of milk, I could actually leave the car running if I wanted, the people seemed so honest (of course I never did). These gals would keep me there to run down the list of all the sale items for the day and to check if I noticed that the tomatoes were ripe and if I had noticed the nice yellow shade of the banana's...........WHO CARES!!!!!! JUST let me pay and get out. Oh, those days changed some 10 years later......but seem to be coming back for some unknown reason. Now the lines are so long in the markets that I decided recently to open my pint of ice cream and start eating it while I was still in line. When I finally reached the check out, the ice cream was gone but the empty carton was still in my basket. The young lady asked where the ice cream was and after I explained that while the person in front of me was taking out a new mortgage on her house with her , I decided to eat the ice cream, I guess she didn't find that so funny. SSSSOOOO....... then I thought I would try something else. I told her that since my ice cream melted away to nothing while waiting that I did not think I had to pay for it. That, apparently she found funny since she laughed and charged me $2.37.
There are so many things that were different from my east coast bringing up. Didn't people out here realize "time is money". We'll talk more about that.................later. Right now I have to make a right hand turn on a red light . Now, that's progress.
1/28/10
OF DAYS GONE BY.........................
I thought for a quick moment, that it would be fun just to send out some things from the past...... photo's .......video's of shows..........stuff like that. Just to break the mold every so ofter. Keep looking for more and see if you may recognize yourself.
1955-Senior Picnic-Jones Beach.........Funny story Teddy M. asked if she could change from shorts to bathing suit in my car, accidently left shorts in my car. When I discovered them I put them in the glovebox. My dad was looking for something next day and discovered them. I could not come up with any good reply to his question." who the hell left their underwear in your car"
1948 Cousin Ruth and Vito
1954- Holloween Party
Edie, Vito, Ellen, Doug, Brud
1955-Senior Picnic-Jones Beach.........Funny story Teddy M. asked if she could change from shorts to bathing suit in my car, accidently left shorts in my car. When I discovered them I put them in the glovebox. My dad was looking for something next day and discovered them. I could not come up with any good reply to his question." who the hell left their underwear in your car"
1954- Holloween Party
Brian
From the Johnny Carson Show (click below)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRduPZvIm08&feature=player_embedded
Gin........the super dog (click below)
>http://www.familytiez.com/video/gin.htm
"Just 4" 1970- Margot, Vito, Scott, Lisa
visiting Margot's Parents in Sweden
I am a Nobody................ Nobody is Perfect...........................Therefore I am Perfect
The cool days of the 50's
Red, White & Blue pants
I thought this would lighten the load a little. Just something a little different for this posting. Hope you like it. I will be trying other things every so often just to keep up your interest in this blog. Have fun with the really good navigational sites included.
1/23/10
DEAR VITO........YOUR UNCLE SAM NEEDS YOU....
WOW!!!!!April 1957. A letter from Uncle Sam!!! I had now been on this new job for a year, rapidly climbing the corporate ladder. Now this!! The one letter that I knew would eventually come but hoping they lost the address. Well, I could wait until letter number 2 came or I could request to have my draft number pushed up, go in the Army and get this over with. What shall I do?? Better check with dad. After speaking with him, along with mom and some of my uncles, I decided to go in request to go earlier and get this over with.........Just as long as the draft board did not get the idea that I wanted to enlist for an extra year. Well I made that request and they heard my concern about going for only 2 years but I would still serve in the reserves when I got back home.
July 4th was my appointed day. Off to Lynbrook to the draft center, for my ride to Ft.Dix, New Jersey. Well, leading up to this day was interesting, all my uncles who served, along with my dad kept pumping information into my head. Never volunteer for any soft sounding jobs, always do exactly what I was told, don't screw up!!............ So many things to remember.
The first day was a routine day, shots, haircut (I asked for square back, slightly touching ears, lite trim.) guess they didn't hear me because when I got out of the barber chair, which only took 4 minutes, I was like a cue ball and just as white. It certainly showed off the tan I had. Next stop, clothes, not really a choice and size did not matter, double breasted? Nay, they all look that way they told me I would grow into them. Got my class "A" dress uniform, then sent me over to the tailor. Fatigues, jackets etc etc etc were one size fits all and the tailors did their best to shorten and hem the pants. The rest seemed a little big but like the man said, one tends to fill them out. By the time I left that building, I had one duffel bag filled to the brim with clothes and shoes. Next stop I picked up my dog tags. These are little metal tags you wear around your neck. I found out that the tags have a little niche in one end that is actually there for a reason. If you were to die, they simply put this edge between you front two teeth and kick it into place. This now identifies you.
Finally got to the barracks about 5PM enough time to be assigned a bunk throw your stuff on it and report for dinner. By this time you are so hungry, food even taste good. Still did not recognise what it was. Back to the barracks to try and put some order into this new life. Setting up my footlocker I needed a printed plan so that everything was in the correct space. Lights out at 9PM but you could still see but much to tired to do anything about it.
Day 2-Day 7
Awaken at 5AM by the sound of a large metal pipe hitting against an empty garbage can and some idiot already shaved, and dressed running around yelling and blowing some stupid whistle. GET A LIFE!!! even the roosters weren't up yet. These were perhaps the most demoralizing days of the eight weeks of basic training. POLITICAL CORRECTNESS was certainly not around these days. I was called everything from Pretty boy, im-bo-sill , mama's white baby to I-TAL-LI-ON WOP. I scrubbed the toilet bowl with a toothbrush, learned that real men started off walking with their left foot, that only girly men started a walk with their right foot. I presume that was for the benefit of our drill Sargent, who to me, had some mental limitations. It was an easy way for him to remember ........left....right....left during our marching drills. He also was unable to remember anyones name, so to him everyone was know by either your nationality or mamas boy. I learned that after having a cigarette, you had to "field strip" it. meaning to slit open the paper part of the cigarette with your nail, sprinkle out the remaining tobacco, if it was a filter tip, you learned how to put it into your pocket and save it until you came to a trash barrel. I learned how to smoke a long cigarette in 30 seconds. I learned that you SHOUT OUT your answers to the Sargent and you ended every sentence with SIR unless it was a Sargent then it was SARGENT. Don't talk soft otherwise you were a mama's boy little girl, that I totally did not understand, but as long as they were happy....so was I. The days were filled with trips to the Doctors for more shots and examinations, Dentist for examinations, filling out papers and more papers, learning how to make a proper bed with hospital corners and tight enough to bounce a quarter off of it. Setting up your foot locker with your serial number on everything from socks to underwear all facing exactly the same way. Here I also learned you never use these clothes, they were strictly for show, how to set up you wall unit so that every piece of clothing was lined up by size going from long to short all facing the same direction. I spent hours spit shining a pair of boots only to lean that I had to also spit shine the back end of the boot (heel) otherwise this alerted the inspecting Sargent that if that part was not shined it reflected that you never wiped yourself when going to the bathroom, another one of those things I never forgot especially when the Sargent had one of the recruits pull down his pants in front of everyone so he check that he indeed wiped himself. I learned that you always had to run from one place to another, no lolliputtin around. WOW!!!!
I was totally exhausted every night, even went to bed without supper occasionally, not because I wanted to but I just found myself dozing off at the wrong times.
Well, apparently, I mastered some of these things because as you can see from the picture, I was made a platoon corporal (honorary of course, not actual) guess this meant I was to mentor some of the really dumb guys, that could not master starting to walk with your left foot or that someone thought I would be the next "Stars and Stripes" model for the uniform. Anyway, the day finally arrived when a volunteer was sought after. I remembered what my dad and my uncles said about not volunteering but this sounded so good. The Sargent was looking for someone with a drivers license, I could only visualize driving the commander or such around BUT using my better judgement I just kept quiet. Later that day when out for on one of our usual 5 mile runs, we were taking a little breather and I happen to look over and see "the volunteers" next to their vehicles............large wheelbarrows loaded up with dirt.........they were driving them for one big hole to a equally big pile of dirt. Now the story goes that when the next class of recruits come in their volunteers will drive wheel barrels from the big pile of dirt back to fill up the hole. Just thought to myself, thanks dad. I will never volunteer. The next 4 weeks went on just about the first week. It was now a week before graduation and we were about to find out the results of all we have learned. What will my MOS be? (military occupational specialty) Well, mine was quiet good. I excelled in administration therefore, I became a clerk in administration at a headquarters company. I found out that my second 8 weeks would be in Arkansas......at an artillery unit.........WHAT??? ME????? ARTILLERY?
1/19/10
THE WEDDING
Well, M and I were in love, it was now decided that we would get married. When??? I don't know..... The question around the SAS building was WHAT??????? one female even accused M of stealing American guys.......well actually .........I think it went down as, " all you foreign girls come over to the states and steal our men" At least, that's the way I understood it. Planning this shin-dig was something else. M's parents and sisters were over in Sweden and it was my responsibility to visit them (per my mom and dad) and get their permission. M contacted them and told them she had met this ITALIAN GUY some time before and I guess it was also expressed on their part that they wanted to meet this ITALIAN GRINGO. Guess they were expecting to see some little short guy with a pencil mustache, and greasy hair wearing a pin strip suit and carrying a big club. Boy did I disappoint them. Anyway, the reception was very nice and the trip turned out well, even to the point that when I asked her mom and dad for her hand,(the old fashion way) I had nothing to put on her finger.......what a schlemiel.......They offered to take us to a store called NK's where we looked at rings but NK only accepted the store credit card or cash, or American Express. Long story short, I was offered the fathers credit card to buy the ring.....good part.......it was 18 carat gold iso the 14 carat sold in the states. I figured this was worth it but the father insisted I pay him back.
Flying back home, I thought it would be fun to propose again and have the navigator chart the exact spot over the Atlantic where I got down on my knees. We also got a bottle of champagne from the crew, that we reluctantly shared with some of the people around our seat area. Wonder where that map went??????
It was decided that my uncle and his band would play at the wedding, we had a friend we'll call Al from SAS who had done catering on board some Danish fishing boat before coming to SAS and we would hold the reception at a private home we could rent from the American Legion, who had it as a meeting place. We tried to keep costs very much into a budget. M agreed to get married in the Catholic Church that all my family were members of but of course M being non-catholic, had to meet the priest that was to perform the wedding. That did not go so well, especially since one of his questions, addressed to both of us but meant, in his eyes, to be directed to M. "have either of you been intimate with each other or anyone else" WWHHOOAA KIMBOSABY!!! what has that got to do with world peace??????????.....that didn't go so well with M and when she refused to answer, and I don't blame her, the priest simply stated that he was to try and stop this marriage unless M and I took other steps. ok! ok! ok! ok! so the other steps were taken. We were married outside the alter at the railing to the alter, and M had to say the words " I promise in front of these witnesses and God to love, honor and OBEY.... till death do us part"...or perhaps some time before,whichever comes first...... Well, we still have discussions some 44years later about the obey part. She needs practice on that subject.....or perhaps........just doesn't know what the word means.
Everything was going well, plans coming together like a Lego toy, until a week before the wedding. Al, decided that the cooking should be done at my parents house and the food frozen down. Al, after a day of work at the airport, would arrive at my parents house each night and he and my father would have a couple of shots of "three feathers" whiskey and polish off a quart of beer before Al even got next to the stove. Much to my mom's total surprise, there was no Italian food being prepared, only different types of fish including the salted herring in all kinds of sauces. Al conceded a little to my mom wanting some Italian food so she brought out her recipe book. Our house turned into an Italian bakery during the day, and a Scandinavian smorgasbord at night OMG!!! what was this wedding turning out to be. Finally, the big day arrived. M's mother and father arrived from Stockholm a few days before and the night before the wedding her father took ill and had to be rushed to the hospital. Guess, he finally came to the reality that his daughter was getting involved with an ITALIAN FAMILY. Anyway, he had a slight heart problem so my father was thrusted into the job of giving M away, He LOVED THAT big time. Meanwhile, Al and a waitress he met at some local bar were over at the house where the reception was being held laying out food and drink. The church part went along smooth and all the Swedish brides maids along with the American and Italian ushers were getting along famously. After the church ceremony it was decided that before the reception, the whole wedding party along with M's mom would go to the hospital to let M's dad enjoy this day to see how great his daughter looked. This event was really funny as all the wedding party had to walk through the maternity ward to get to M's dads room. Of course, the biggest comment along that route as "JUST IN TIME, WE DID IT JUST IN TIME"
It was well worth that little detour just to see the happiness on Bengts face.
When we finally reached the reception, the crowd was there, about 100 Italian or American guests along with M's side of about 50 Swedish girls, looking like a Swedish version of the Radio City Rochette's. All my Italian uncles were in 7th heaven, and their wives sat there with pads and pencils taking notes, if necessary to provide later at divorce court. The usual first dance, second dance, bride dance with the grooms father, grooms dance with the brides mother, group dance,Tarantella dance, Swedish May Day pole dance and what ever all those dances were called led to the throwing of the brides garter, which I completed without a hitch. Then came the toast. My best man was to toast us with a small speech, I was then to look into the eyes of my new bride, click glasses and kiss. Well, everything was going along as planned. The photographer was poised for that memorable photo. However, Just as the toast speech was finished, I looked at M and suddenly Al, the caterer who was standing in back of me, reached out, grabbed my glass and ended up clicking the glass with M and getting the kiss.........WHA JUST HAPPEN!!! WHERE THE HELL DID HE COME FROM????. the picture was so good and real, we kept it in our album.
As the evening progress, the usual ......."March for the favor".......began. This is where the bride and groom, seated at the head table bring out "the Pillow case" all the people line up ........with their envelopes of offering......march past the lovely couple, drop into the pillow case their offering for a futile and happy life, collect their little "favor" ours was a tiny vase, with 3 white almonds wrapped in Italian lace and return to their assigned tables. At Italian weddings, the tables are usually assigned since some people get along better than others. This was the part of the evening where my uncles and aunts all walked as couples. My uncles still discussing "why all the fish stuff" my aunts dressed to the gills, all with corsages and mink or whatever stoles. In fact one of my aunts mink wrap was so new I swore I heard it MMEEOOOWWW, when she walked past. Just DROP THE MONEY IN THE BUCKET. Al was superbly dressed in his chefs uniform helping everyone pick and choose from the GIANT GIANT Smorgasbord table and his young waitress serving wine, whiskey and good wishes. I'm not exactly sure but I heard from my mom that sometime during the evening, the doorbell rang and my mom went to answer the door. One of our guests who just arrived that day from Denmark had been driving around looking for the reception, finally found it simply by the amount of the cars filling the street. As my mom greeted him and took his overcoat to put in the closet she was startled my Al,and the waitress hidden amongst the coats toasting each other. I had to tell her that it was a Danish tradition. The evening progressed where my uncles, all at least a head shorter than the Swedish girls were giving dance instructions to them. Finally!!!!, they were learning the Tarantella, Copacabana cha cha, Cuban rumsamba and the Mexican crossing the Rio Grande hat dance. To the day they died my uncles always asked about those gals each time we visited them.
Flying back home, I thought it would be fun to propose again and have the navigator chart the exact spot over the Atlantic where I got down on my knees. We also got a bottle of champagne from the crew, that we reluctantly shared with some of the people around our seat area. Wonder where that map went??????
It was decided that my uncle and his band would play at the wedding, we had a friend we'll call Al from SAS who had done catering on board some Danish fishing boat before coming to SAS and we would hold the reception at a private home we could rent from the American Legion, who had it as a meeting place. We tried to keep costs very much into a budget. M agreed to get married in the Catholic Church that all my family were members of but of course M being non-catholic, had to meet the priest that was to perform the wedding. That did not go so well, especially since one of his questions, addressed to both of us but meant, in his eyes, to be directed to M. "have either of you been intimate with each other or anyone else" WWHHOOAA KIMBOSABY!!! what has that got to do with world peace??????????.....that didn't go so well with M and when she refused to answer, and I don't blame her, the priest simply stated that he was to try and stop this marriage unless M and I took other steps. ok! ok! ok! ok! so the other steps were taken. We were married outside the alter at the railing to the alter, and M had to say the words " I promise in front of these witnesses and God to love, honor and OBEY.... till death do us part"...or perhaps some time before,whichever comes first...... Well, we still have discussions some 44years later about the obey part. She needs practice on that subject.....or perhaps........just doesn't know what the word means.
Everything was going well, plans coming together like a Lego toy, until a week before the wedding. Al, decided that the cooking should be done at my parents house and the food frozen down. Al, after a day of work at the airport, would arrive at my parents house each night and he and my father would have a couple of shots of "three feathers" whiskey and polish off a quart of beer before Al even got next to the stove. Much to my mom's total surprise, there was no Italian food being prepared, only different types of fish including the salted herring in all kinds of sauces. Al conceded a little to my mom wanting some Italian food so she brought out her recipe book. Our house turned into an Italian bakery during the day, and a Scandinavian smorgasbord at night OMG!!! what was this wedding turning out to be. Finally, the big day arrived. M's mother and father arrived from Stockholm a few days before and the night before the wedding her father took ill and had to be rushed to the hospital. Guess, he finally came to the reality that his daughter was getting involved with an ITALIAN FAMILY. Anyway, he had a slight heart problem so my father was thrusted into the job of giving M away, He LOVED THAT big time. Meanwhile, Al and a waitress he met at some local bar were over at the house where the reception was being held laying out food and drink. The church part went along smooth and all the Swedish brides maids along with the American and Italian ushers were getting along famously. After the church ceremony it was decided that before the reception, the whole wedding party along with M's mom would go to the hospital to let M's dad enjoy this day to see how great his daughter looked. This event was really funny as all the wedding party had to walk through the maternity ward to get to M's dads room. Of course, the biggest comment along that route as "JUST IN TIME, WE DID IT JUST IN TIME"
It was well worth that little detour just to see the happiness on Bengts face.
When we finally reached the reception, the crowd was there, about 100 Italian or American guests along with M's side of about 50 Swedish girls, looking like a Swedish version of the Radio City Rochette's. All my Italian uncles were in 7th heaven, and their wives sat there with pads and pencils taking notes, if necessary to provide later at divorce court. The usual first dance, second dance, bride dance with the grooms father, grooms dance with the brides mother, group dance,Tarantella dance, Swedish May Day pole dance and what ever all those dances were called led to the throwing of the brides garter, which I completed without a hitch. Then came the toast. My best man was to toast us with a small speech, I was then to look into the eyes of my new bride, click glasses and kiss. Well, everything was going along as planned. The photographer was poised for that memorable photo. However, Just as the toast speech was finished, I looked at M and suddenly Al, the caterer who was standing in back of me, reached out, grabbed my glass and ended up clicking the glass with M and getting the kiss.........WHA JUST HAPPEN!!! WHERE THE HELL DID HE COME FROM????. the picture was so good and real, we kept it in our album.
As the evening progress, the usual ......."March for the favor".......began. This is where the bride and groom, seated at the head table bring out "the Pillow case" all the people line up ........with their envelopes of offering......march past the lovely couple, drop into the pillow case their offering for a futile and happy life, collect their little "favor" ours was a tiny vase, with 3 white almonds wrapped in Italian lace and return to their assigned tables. At Italian weddings, the tables are usually assigned since some people get along better than others. This was the part of the evening where my uncles and aunts all walked as couples. My uncles still discussing "why all the fish stuff" my aunts dressed to the gills, all with corsages and mink or whatever stoles. In fact one of my aunts mink wrap was so new I swore I heard it MMEEOOOWWW, when she walked past. Just DROP THE MONEY IN THE BUCKET. Al was superbly dressed in his chefs uniform helping everyone pick and choose from the GIANT GIANT Smorgasbord table and his young waitress serving wine, whiskey and good wishes. I'm not exactly sure but I heard from my mom that sometime during the evening, the doorbell rang and my mom went to answer the door. One of our guests who just arrived that day from Denmark had been driving around looking for the reception, finally found it simply by the amount of the cars filling the street. As my mom greeted him and took his overcoat to put in the closet she was startled my Al,and the waitress hidden amongst the coats toasting each other. I had to tell her that it was a Danish tradition. The evening progressed where my uncles, all at least a head shorter than the Swedish girls were giving dance instructions to them. Finally!!!!, they were learning the Tarantella, Copacabana cha cha, Cuban rumsamba and the Mexican crossing the Rio Grande hat dance. To the day they died my uncles always asked about those gals each time we visited them.
1/18/10
THE COURTSHIP TO THE WEDDING............
There is nothing more that can be added to the title of this chapter. I was now 29 years old, still living at home, working,and dating as much as I could. However, there just was something missing.........oh ! I know,.....a wife. Once upon a time, I met this Swedish girl. Nice looking, smart, easy to talk to but untouchable since she had a French boyfriend, at least that's the information I had gotten from some of my friends. I had transferred from Indoor sales at SAS to the passenger service department at JFK. I kept in touch with my good friends and supervisors at head office and would often call or visit them. One day, I noticed something new sitting in my seat of the reservation department. A sweet looking blue eyed, blonde with a touch of a Swedish accent. OH MY!!! I immediately had to know where the other 10 people were that was hired to take my place and more so, what they knew about this young lady. That's when I learned of the French Pierre. I was advised to stay away from her, even to the point that my ex dept supervisor told me that she would never go out with the likes of me. Come again??? now that phrase made me more determined to act. I tried some idle talking with her and she seemed receptive to conversation but put the brakes on for any more conversation than that. Maybe, just maybe my friends were right. So I decided to leave well enough alone (for the time being).
One night I had to call reservations to get some information regarding the booking for one of the outgoing passengers. Low and behold, who did I get on the line. You guessed it. After I got the information I was looking for, I reminded this young lady that this was St. Patricks Day and the tradition was to go out and drink green beer. After several minutes I convinced her to take a chance, meet me after work and we would have some green beer. She told me that she got off work at 11 PM and I could meet her at the front door of the building, not knowing I still had a key to that door. I was there at 10:30 just to make sure I did not miss this chance.
We ended up across the street from the head office and as promised had our green beer. The conversation was very warm as we told each other as much as anyone would say on a "first date" even though we agreed it was not a date. That night ended by me driving her to her apartment in Manhattan, getting a nice thank you and a hand shake at her door to the apartment house (not even at her apartment). On the way back home to Long Island I kept thinking of my next move.
Some weeks later, after calls to her at work, I was about to leave on a round the world trip with 3 of my friends from that office, another guy and 2 gals, I learned that "M" had broken up with her boyfriend, but I never let on that we were out together. I Sent postcards to her and ended each one with "Hope to see you on my return" On my return, the dating began to get more consistent, the telephone calls more frequent. I remember bringing her to my home one night for dinner with my parents. My mother notice that she had the beginnings of a cold and at that point "M" was told that she was to stay at our house in our spare room and my mom would nurse her back to health. One thing you never do in an Italian family and that's to go against the wishes of mama. There she stayed for 3 days with mama keeping tabs on me and taking care of "M". As the weeks and months went by, the dating became almost a daily thing even to the point that I could feel that my parents were calculating the time for me to be moving out-----finally now that I was 28 years old.
During this period of dating, M and I decided to take a short week-end trip to Puerto Rico to get some sun. Well, being a good Catholic boy, I simply could not come to terms to tell my parents,.....so.....as far as they knew, I was going down alone but M would pick me up at the airport on my return and bring me home. The weekend was terrific, sun, sand and beach......me with a beautiful tan .......M like a little lobster. Arriving back home though was something else. I remember my moms first words,,,,, "you look so good with that tan, Vito" " you know M, Vito was in Puerto Rico" " why are you so red, dear, do you have a rash" WHAAAAA????? could mom be that naive?
Now, I know in the eyes of my mom, I was HUNK of the year......she was constantly trying to get me to date daughters of her friends. I did once. The girl was nice and had the largest breasts one could imagine in those days. One night I decided to ask her to come down to the bowling alley, the SAS bowling club used. When she walked in half of the club just followed her like they would their bowling ball just before it hit the pins. When she walked over to me, I immediately became the hit and the envy of all the guys. They all came over to compliment me on picking up a 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,0 spare( even though I carried an average of 225) just to get a closer look at her purple cashmere sweater. The only thing going against this gal was her family was only bidding 3 chickens, 2 ducks and 1 sheep of her dowry for my last name.
Another time, while working at JFK, I checked in a nice gal from Tombstone, Arizona. We talked and she invited me to visit her someday, since I was so interested in Tombstone and the famous shootout at OK corral. A month later I had heard from her and I made the trip out for a week-end. Now, in all honesty, this was totally platonic, She and I visited all the sightseeing things, had pictures taken with the town's sheriff and Miss Kitty, the saloon owner etc, etc, etc. I stayed ALONE at the hotel, the only thing is I was afraid to tell M about it since, at that point,.....We were only dating......but things were going well between us, so I told her I had to work a charter flight in Chicago......dumb mistake!..... M who had a friend that worked AA airlines reservations were talking and my name came up in the conversation. M told her girl friend that I was working a flight in Chicago and her friend offered to find out flight arrival time since M was picking me up at the airport. Well, I guess it came as a surprise, how well American Airlines Sabre reservation system was so advanced to be able to track me ......not to Chicago........but to Tuscon......even to my hotel room......where I confirmed my booking from. Needless to say, the day I arrived back to JFK, M was there to meet me and asked how the charter went wwwhhhhyyyy do you ask in that tone.......honey? She indeed told me why!!!!!!! what promises I had to make. WE WERE ONLY DATING!!!!!!!
One night I had to call reservations to get some information regarding the booking for one of the outgoing passengers. Low and behold, who did I get on the line. You guessed it. After I got the information I was looking for, I reminded this young lady that this was St. Patricks Day and the tradition was to go out and drink green beer. After several minutes I convinced her to take a chance, meet me after work and we would have some green beer. She told me that she got off work at 11 PM and I could meet her at the front door of the building, not knowing I still had a key to that door. I was there at 10:30 just to make sure I did not miss this chance.
We ended up across the street from the head office and as promised had our green beer. The conversation was very warm as we told each other as much as anyone would say on a "first date" even though we agreed it was not a date. That night ended by me driving her to her apartment in Manhattan, getting a nice thank you and a hand shake at her door to the apartment house (not even at her apartment). On the way back home to Long Island I kept thinking of my next move.
Some weeks later, after calls to her at work, I was about to leave on a round the world trip with 3 of my friends from that office, another guy and 2 gals, I learned that "M" had broken up with her boyfriend, but I never let on that we were out together. I Sent postcards to her and ended each one with "Hope to see you on my return" On my return, the dating began to get more consistent, the telephone calls more frequent. I remember bringing her to my home one night for dinner with my parents. My mother notice that she had the beginnings of a cold and at that point "M" was told that she was to stay at our house in our spare room and my mom would nurse her back to health. One thing you never do in an Italian family and that's to go against the wishes of mama. There she stayed for 3 days with mama keeping tabs on me and taking care of "M". As the weeks and months went by, the dating became almost a daily thing even to the point that I could feel that my parents were calculating the time for me to be moving out-----finally now that I was 28 years old.
During this period of dating, M and I decided to take a short week-end trip to Puerto Rico to get some sun. Well, being a good Catholic boy, I simply could not come to terms to tell my parents,.....so.....as far as they knew, I was going down alone but M would pick me up at the airport on my return and bring me home. The weekend was terrific, sun, sand and beach......me with a beautiful tan .......M like a little lobster. Arriving back home though was something else. I remember my moms first words,,,,, "you look so good with that tan, Vito" " you know M, Vito was in Puerto Rico" " why are you so red, dear, do you have a rash" WHAAAAA????? could mom be that naive?
Now, I know in the eyes of my mom, I was HUNK of the year......she was constantly trying to get me to date daughters of her friends. I did once. The girl was nice and had the largest breasts one could imagine in those days. One night I decided to ask her to come down to the bowling alley, the SAS bowling club used. When she walked in half of the club just followed her like they would their bowling ball just before it hit the pins. When she walked over to me, I immediately became the hit and the envy of all the guys. They all came over to compliment me on picking up a 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,0 spare( even though I carried an average of 225) just to get a closer look at her purple cashmere sweater. The only thing going against this gal was her family was only bidding 3 chickens, 2 ducks and 1 sheep of her dowry for my last name.
Another time, while working at JFK, I checked in a nice gal from Tombstone, Arizona. We talked and she invited me to visit her someday, since I was so interested in Tombstone and the famous shootout at OK corral. A month later I had heard from her and I made the trip out for a week-end. Now, in all honesty, this was totally platonic, She and I visited all the sightseeing things, had pictures taken with the town's sheriff and Miss Kitty, the saloon owner etc, etc, etc. I stayed ALONE at the hotel, the only thing is I was afraid to tell M about it since, at that point,.....We were only dating......but things were going well between us, so I told her I had to work a charter flight in Chicago......dumb mistake!..... M who had a friend that worked AA airlines reservations were talking and my name came up in the conversation. M told her girl friend that I was working a flight in Chicago and her friend offered to find out flight arrival time since M was picking me up at the airport. Well, I guess it came as a surprise, how well American Airlines Sabre reservation system was so advanced to be able to track me ......not to Chicago........but to Tuscon......even to my hotel room......where I confirmed my booking from. Needless to say, the day I arrived back to JFK, M was there to meet me and asked how the charter went wwwhhhhyyyy do you ask in that tone.......honey? She indeed told me why!!!!!!! what promises I had to make. WE WERE ONLY DATING!!!!!!!
1/16/10
WHO AM I................REALLY?
I have tried to put these posts into some kind of Chronological order but have been very unsuccessful at it. Well, there's a reason for that. You see, I lay in bed at night thinking of all these things and as I think about them, is how I write about them, so you now know the reason for the mixing up in the order. Besides, life has no particular order......so it's said. By whom??? I don't know.
I guess I had always had some kind of a sense of humor and being an extrovert it was easy for me to express myself in humorous dialogue. This funny bone started to really show during my SAS years and really took off towards the end of my career. I was asked by some friends to do little speeches at birthday party's, retirement party's, weddings, and luncheons. They primarily consisted of jokes but I learned how to relate to my family or other people's family's in a humorous way. I was always told by my parents that one should not be mean to another or talk down to them and that I do not do. I can actually hold a conversation that people believe is really true, but in reality is fiction. My grand kids are my greatest audience. I sit and talk with them about so many things, they will immediately turn to grandma and say "Grandma is that true" Only after grandma confirms the truthfulness will they continue to talk about that subject. If grandma shows any signs that I am exaggerating they loose interest.
One thing I have found is that you cannot laugh at anyone until you are able to laugh at yourself, guess that's why so many of my screw ups in life are so damn funny. My secret is to take a joke and replace all the names with names of people I know even if it means my own family. On the other hand, my family has been able to keep me in stories to last well beyond my time on earth. Some say that telling stories about my dead relatives is evil. Evil to who? they don't know about it. Now, when I am asked to do a speech for example at a party for someone turning 60, I just remember a joke and replace names with the name of the person having the party. A very pretty Italian lady with a very nice figure for her age recently turned 60 and I was asked to give a little roast. The story went like this.
"I remember Pia when she was 30 and here I am once again. Seems like she only wants to see me every 10 years. When she was thirty, she always wore tight sweaters and mini shirts, well as you can see she no longer wears tight sweater and mini skirts, now its just a baggy sweatshirt and a long skirt,...now I don't want to say that her breast started to fall but.........seems that her nipples started to show...........she is the only lady I know that can have a mammogram and a pedicure at the same time." " Pia, also loved to go for mud packs to make her skin really shine, well, the last mud pack was 2 days ago and she looked really good, today the mud started to fall off." Pia recently discovered that wrinkles were beginning to appear in her face and neck so off to a plastic surgeon she goes. She sat down for her free 1 hour diagnosis and the surgeon prepared her for hearing the worst. Pia your getting old and with age come wrinkles, however through research, a new procedure was discover and we can perform an operation that can take care of most wrinkles. I can insert a knob in the top of your head and you can cover it with your natural hair if you wear a bun around it. Every time you see some wrinkles starting to show, just turn this knob one quarter of a turn clockwise and the wrinkle will disappear. Well, Pia goes home and with each sign of a wrinkle off came the bun and a one quarter turn pulled the skin up to a tighter position. The went on for 3 years until one day Pia finds herself at the doctors office. Doctor I have these bags under my eyes and I just can't get rid of them. What shall I do? Doctor looks at them and finally discovers the cause, telling Pia, I'm sorry those are not bags under your eyes, the tightening of the skin has simply pulled you boobs up further than expected........OH! , that explains the mustache!!!!!!! Good Night folks.
I guess I had always had some kind of a sense of humor and being an extrovert it was easy for me to express myself in humorous dialogue. This funny bone started to really show during my SAS years and really took off towards the end of my career. I was asked by some friends to do little speeches at birthday party's, retirement party's, weddings, and luncheons. They primarily consisted of jokes but I learned how to relate to my family or other people's family's in a humorous way. I was always told by my parents that one should not be mean to another or talk down to them and that I do not do. I can actually hold a conversation that people believe is really true, but in reality is fiction. My grand kids are my greatest audience. I sit and talk with them about so many things, they will immediately turn to grandma and say "Grandma is that true" Only after grandma confirms the truthfulness will they continue to talk about that subject. If grandma shows any signs that I am exaggerating they loose interest.
One thing I have found is that you cannot laugh at anyone until you are able to laugh at yourself, guess that's why so many of my screw ups in life are so damn funny. My secret is to take a joke and replace all the names with names of people I know even if it means my own family. On the other hand, my family has been able to keep me in stories to last well beyond my time on earth. Some say that telling stories about my dead relatives is evil. Evil to who? they don't know about it. Now, when I am asked to do a speech for example at a party for someone turning 60, I just remember a joke and replace names with the name of the person having the party. A very pretty Italian lady with a very nice figure for her age recently turned 60 and I was asked to give a little roast. The story went like this.
"I remember Pia when she was 30 and here I am once again. Seems like she only wants to see me every 10 years. When she was thirty, she always wore tight sweaters and mini shirts, well as you can see she no longer wears tight sweater and mini skirts, now its just a baggy sweatshirt and a long skirt,...now I don't want to say that her breast started to fall but.........seems that her nipples started to show...........she is the only lady I know that can have a mammogram and a pedicure at the same time." " Pia, also loved to go for mud packs to make her skin really shine, well, the last mud pack was 2 days ago and she looked really good, today the mud started to fall off." Pia recently discovered that wrinkles were beginning to appear in her face and neck so off to a plastic surgeon she goes. She sat down for her free 1 hour diagnosis and the surgeon prepared her for hearing the worst. Pia your getting old and with age come wrinkles, however through research, a new procedure was discover and we can perform an operation that can take care of most wrinkles. I can insert a knob in the top of your head and you can cover it with your natural hair if you wear a bun around it. Every time you see some wrinkles starting to show, just turn this knob one quarter of a turn clockwise and the wrinkle will disappear. Well, Pia goes home and with each sign of a wrinkle off came the bun and a one quarter turn pulled the skin up to a tighter position. The went on for 3 years until one day Pia finds herself at the doctors office. Doctor I have these bags under my eyes and I just can't get rid of them. What shall I do? Doctor looks at them and finally discovers the cause, telling Pia, I'm sorry those are not bags under your eyes, the tightening of the skin has simply pulled you boobs up further than expected........OH! , that explains the mustache!!!!!!! Good Night folks.
1/14/10
SAS..........THE BEGINNING YEARS
I must say, from the very start that my years at SAS were probably some of the happiest years I spent working. Having said that, I must also admit that if someone was to ask me how it was while I was going through that time, the answer would be a little different. All of the bad times, when looked at after some years, turned the corner and made them good times.
I was a young 19 year old when I was first introduced to SAS, by my next door neighbor, who worked in the accounting department. I was interviewed for a job and perhaps it was my Post Office experience that I had acquired in the months after high school that led to my being immediately hired as a mail boy. Who really cared what the job was, all I could think of in those days were beautiful Swedish girls with blonde hair and blue eyes and beautiful long legs. Stockholm, OOHH!!!! the city of free love.............wrong!!!!. Never the less, a head office job, where all of the big wigs hung out, I'm sure to get recognized for my talents there. "MAIL BOY?" said my father, "your giving up going to collage for that?" " but dad, The deal was, that if Princeton would not take me, it's off to work I go. I can always pick and choose college courses later and pick up some knowledge, besides I learned a lot in high school. What more is there to learn right now? " The mail room job turned out fantastically, During the time that bonuses were being paid out, I was extremely popular. I got all the information at least 1 day before personnel got it. You see, I was able to see the memo's coming down from the top dogs to personnel advising how much moola was being paid for each point employees earned. The point system was very easy to figure out. You earned points for years of service, sick leave not taken, job description, last evaluation, all information employees knew of themselves. All they needed now was dollar value per point. Mail boys had that info. There was nothing wrong with giving out this info. the memo's were not sealed and always delivered to personnel the same day as received, usually the last mail pick-up, so the employees would know either the next day or two. Now, also immediately next door to the mail room was the advertising stock room. All the latest items that were purchased to give out as advertising gimmicks. These were given to big accounts, travel agents etc. I still have a few. Here again, nothing dishonest, these items were there to be given out. One of the brightest moments was the Christmas party held in the Presidents office on the last day of work before the holiday. I still have on 8MM film this party, even to the point of having the Presidents chauffeur sitting with his feet up on the Presidents desk......what a hoot......
It wasn't long (about 6 months) that it became apparent my talents were found by the upper echelon. I was called into the managers office and told that personnel wanted to speak to me about a promotion. Funny, how this played out, it was also the end to my probation time and I also passed two other people that had been in the department longer. WOW!!! I sat down with the personnel manager and he explained two jobs I could go into. One was Cargo.......eeeehhhhh no thanks this 159 lb. body over a very lanky frame could not push boxes around a warehouse. Telephone Sales,......now we're talking.......or as they called it in those days, inside sales. Nowadays....reservations agent....what the hell, I knew the department from delivering mail to it, girls seemed nice and I was able to make friends with the manager and his assistant........SURE.....I'll give it a try. Turned out pretty nice. First week sent for training in the sales department training room, two doors away from the mail room, my old stomping ground. After that week, I was sent back up and began my new job. I had the have a supervisor, listen in on all my calls and every time I showed any sign of an error, she would signal me to put the caller on hold, we would discuss the situation and back I went to the customer. I never had any fear of talking to customers and covered my little errors with expertise about nothing. My peers turned out to be extremely nice and my popularity began to soar. During my years there, our department formed a softball team to play any and all other departments, held parties that started at 11 PM, since some people had to work shifts, started a happy hour club at the tavern across the street from head office, excelled in dart throwing and beer chugging and mastered the art of selling vacation trip beyond what the aircraft would hold. AAAHHHHH its OK they will take care of it at the airport. In fact, we did so well one year that they had to call in a staff from Copenhagen, just to offload foreign passengers and we in return sent a staff of agents to Copenhagen to do the same for returning US passengers. SayLaVi.
I made my first oversees trip within that first year......to....of course....Sweden just to see if all the rumors were true. Well, much to my surprise, the Swedish girls, I would have taken home to mom were very hard to meet and it wasn't long I found the only way to meet them was to be formally introduced to them. Guess, I had to pull something out of the hat. I remember going into the Stockholm city office and introducing myself to a agent as a colleague from America with the excuse of needing to list myself for a flight back home. She, wanting to know about New York, agreed to have a cup of coffee with me. Now, I had a friend that would introduce me to other friends. Way to Go!!!! I found out that she was also the daughter of the owner of SAAB MOTORS and would be coming over to New York to work for a short time and was bringing a girl friend over to work temporarily in the head office. Did I step in it or what??? It turned out that she was also one of Sweden's top rally car drivers, only one thing on the questionable list, she was a good 2",s taller than me, but who cares, I could easily get that with pads in my shoes.
That first trip, still remains in my mind. I will never forget it as it gave me an extra 16 days in Copenhagen. Of course at the time it was horrible, but then I keep remembering the good things. I was listed for the flight and placed on the standby list. Each day I went to the airport and stood by for the flight back to New York. Each day, it would end up the same way, no seats left for me. The bad part was that each day there were other employees trying to get back home to the states and I found that they were also being added to the ever increasing numbers of stand bys. We all tried with great difficulty to conserve money for hotels, we even moved in with each other or sneaked into someones room to sleep on a couch or in a chair since money was now becoming tight. Those lucky enough to be traveling on company business could go into the SAS office to draw on perdiem and would lend money to those that did not have any available. The list grew and on the 15th day, the now up to 60 standby passengers were once again told no room....but the bright side was near. The President of SAS, inc. now had convinced the higher echelon in Stockholm to put another flight on just for the standbys since 60 employees was probably 1/3 of all the North American employees at that time. That night I remember sleeping at a place called the Dixie bar, since rooms were now becoming overcrowded and everything seemed to go by seniority. I ordered one beer, sat down at a table, sipped my beer and finally my head just hit the table. Some people did not know if I was knocked out or just sleeping. It was about 6 am when my eyes opened and I could see familiar faces around the table all looking the same. Time for breakfast,(rest of the beer) and out to the airport.......again. The time with a different result, All 60 employees made it back on "SAS Party Flight 911A" It was so very nice to circle JFK. Always wondered if that was a payback compliments of the airport staff for overbooking so many flights.
I was a young 19 year old when I was first introduced to SAS, by my next door neighbor, who worked in the accounting department. I was interviewed for a job and perhaps it was my Post Office experience that I had acquired in the months after high school that led to my being immediately hired as a mail boy. Who really cared what the job was, all I could think of in those days were beautiful Swedish girls with blonde hair and blue eyes and beautiful long legs. Stockholm, OOHH!!!! the city of free love.............wrong!!!!. Never the less, a head office job, where all of the big wigs hung out, I'm sure to get recognized for my talents there. "MAIL BOY?" said my father, "your giving up going to collage for that?" " but dad, The deal was, that if Princeton would not take me, it's off to work I go. I can always pick and choose college courses later and pick up some knowledge, besides I learned a lot in high school. What more is there to learn right now? " The mail room job turned out fantastically, During the time that bonuses were being paid out, I was extremely popular. I got all the information at least 1 day before personnel got it. You see, I was able to see the memo's coming down from the top dogs to personnel advising how much moola was being paid for each point employees earned. The point system was very easy to figure out. You earned points for years of service, sick leave not taken, job description, last evaluation, all information employees knew of themselves. All they needed now was dollar value per point. Mail boys had that info. There was nothing wrong with giving out this info. the memo's were not sealed and always delivered to personnel the same day as received, usually the last mail pick-up, so the employees would know either the next day or two. Now, also immediately next door to the mail room was the advertising stock room. All the latest items that were purchased to give out as advertising gimmicks. These were given to big accounts, travel agents etc. I still have a few. Here again, nothing dishonest, these items were there to be given out. One of the brightest moments was the Christmas party held in the Presidents office on the last day of work before the holiday. I still have on 8MM film this party, even to the point of having the Presidents chauffeur sitting with his feet up on the Presidents desk......what a hoot......
It wasn't long (about 6 months) that it became apparent my talents were found by the upper echelon. I was called into the managers office and told that personnel wanted to speak to me about a promotion. Funny, how this played out, it was also the end to my probation time and I also passed two other people that had been in the department longer. WOW!!! I sat down with the personnel manager and he explained two jobs I could go into. One was Cargo.......eeeehhhhh no thanks this 159 lb. body over a very lanky frame could not push boxes around a warehouse. Telephone Sales,......now we're talking.......or as they called it in those days, inside sales. Nowadays....reservations agent....what the hell, I knew the department from delivering mail to it, girls seemed nice and I was able to make friends with the manager and his assistant........SURE.....I'll give it a try. Turned out pretty nice. First week sent for training in the sales department training room, two doors away from the mail room, my old stomping ground. After that week, I was sent back up and began my new job. I had the have a supervisor, listen in on all my calls and every time I showed any sign of an error, she would signal me to put the caller on hold, we would discuss the situation and back I went to the customer. I never had any fear of talking to customers and covered my little errors with expertise about nothing. My peers turned out to be extremely nice and my popularity began to soar. During my years there, our department formed a softball team to play any and all other departments, held parties that started at 11 PM, since some people had to work shifts, started a happy hour club at the tavern across the street from head office, excelled in dart throwing and beer chugging and mastered the art of selling vacation trip beyond what the aircraft would hold. AAAHHHHH its OK they will take care of it at the airport. In fact, we did so well one year that they had to call in a staff from Copenhagen, just to offload foreign passengers and we in return sent a staff of agents to Copenhagen to do the same for returning US passengers. SayLaVi.
I made my first oversees trip within that first year......to....of course....Sweden just to see if all the rumors were true. Well, much to my surprise, the Swedish girls, I would have taken home to mom were very hard to meet and it wasn't long I found the only way to meet them was to be formally introduced to them. Guess, I had to pull something out of the hat. I remember going into the Stockholm city office and introducing myself to a agent as a colleague from America with the excuse of needing to list myself for a flight back home. She, wanting to know about New York, agreed to have a cup of coffee with me. Now, I had a friend that would introduce me to other friends. Way to Go!!!! I found out that she was also the daughter of the owner of SAAB MOTORS and would be coming over to New York to work for a short time and was bringing a girl friend over to work temporarily in the head office. Did I step in it or what??? It turned out that she was also one of Sweden's top rally car drivers, only one thing on the questionable list, she was a good 2",s taller than me, but who cares, I could easily get that with pads in my shoes.
That first trip, still remains in my mind. I will never forget it as it gave me an extra 16 days in Copenhagen. Of course at the time it was horrible, but then I keep remembering the good things. I was listed for the flight and placed on the standby list. Each day I went to the airport and stood by for the flight back to New York. Each day, it would end up the same way, no seats left for me. The bad part was that each day there were other employees trying to get back home to the states and I found that they were also being added to the ever increasing numbers of stand bys. We all tried with great difficulty to conserve money for hotels, we even moved in with each other or sneaked into someones room to sleep on a couch or in a chair since money was now becoming tight. Those lucky enough to be traveling on company business could go into the SAS office to draw on perdiem and would lend money to those that did not have any available. The list grew and on the 15th day, the now up to 60 standby passengers were once again told no room....but the bright side was near. The President of SAS, inc. now had convinced the higher echelon in Stockholm to put another flight on just for the standbys since 60 employees was probably 1/3 of all the North American employees at that time. That night I remember sleeping at a place called the Dixie bar, since rooms were now becoming overcrowded and everything seemed to go by seniority. I ordered one beer, sat down at a table, sipped my beer and finally my head just hit the table. Some people did not know if I was knocked out or just sleeping. It was about 6 am when my eyes opened and I could see familiar faces around the table all looking the same. Time for breakfast,(rest of the beer) and out to the airport.......again. The time with a different result, All 60 employees made it back on "SAS Party Flight 911A" It was so very nice to circle JFK. Always wondered if that was a payback compliments of the airport staff for overbooking so many flights.
1/12/10
THEN..........."N"............NOW
I began to think on why I really started the blog and came to several conclusions
a) to keep this mind of mine from rusting away.
b) try and get some fun out of remembering.
c) keep me from Alzheimer's.
d) compare the old with the new.
e) none of the above.
f) all of the above plus more.
At the rate the economy is burning through my millions, I can leave my family this book of blogs, instead of any money. I doubt if there will be enough left to give my kids or their kids, anything else. I have always promised my kids one dollar when I leave this earth, but guess the only thing they can really rely on is a bit of the past. Something for them to really remember me by. So, here I sit, gazing steadily into space, remembering all the good things in days gone by and trying to compare that with what we have presently and what they will have in the future. I really don't believe what our politicians are saying about leaving our kids in debt, I think its just poppy-cock. Our parents probably were told the same during the depression and we made it OK. I have confidence that our kids will also make it.
a) to keep this mind of mine from rusting away.
b) try and get some fun out of remembering.
c) keep me from Alzheimer's.
d) compare the old with the new.
e) none of the above.
f) all of the above plus more.
At the rate the economy is burning through my millions, I can leave my family this book of blogs, instead of any money. I doubt if there will be enough left to give my kids or their kids, anything else. I have always promised my kids one dollar when I leave this earth, but guess the only thing they can really rely on is a bit of the past. Something for them to really remember me by. So, here I sit, gazing steadily into space, remembering all the good things in days gone by and trying to compare that with what we have presently and what they will have in the future. I really don't believe what our politicians are saying about leaving our kids in debt, I think its just poppy-cock. Our parents probably were told the same during the depression and we made it OK. I have confidence that our kids will also make it.
Now, the way I see it going down is, we have a mini-war going on in this country as I write. A war that matches the red states against the blue states. The red states are made up of people that believe things should be done their way and the blue states feel the same. In my opinion this last happened in 1861, the start of " the war between the States " which actually created some fictitious line drawn in the sand called the "Mason-Dixon line" To the south of this line were some dudes called rebels in the grey uniforms (red states) To the north were the union in blue uniforms. Now, it became time to elect a leader of the country called "President" It just so happened that there were more union men than rebel men and some skinny guy with a crazy beard and a stove pipe hat from Illinois won this election. What you also have to know is that some years before some rich rebels that were growing cotton and tobacco could not find to many guys to work long days out in the fields, in the heat picking this stuff so one weekend a group of the rebels rented a boat and went over to the West Indies to buy some people,that were rumored to be able to do this type of job, loaded them on the boat and brought them back to work the fields. Well, since we did not have any legal requirements to enter the country at that time, we could not call them illegal immigrants, and since they bought and paid for them, they called them slaves. The skinny guy with the stove pipe hat didn't like this to much and wanted these slaves made free so they could move up north and work in the factories. The red states said NO and the blue states said YES. (sound familiar) and soon after we found the grays fighting the blues (with guns and stuff) because the grays said they had the second amendment and God on their side. Four years or so later the blues won, I think it was because they just had more guys on their side. We presently have something similar with the only change being no one has brought out the guns and stuff yet. We still have the grays and the blues, with the grays still thinking that GOD and the 2nd amendment is totally on their side, the blues saying there should be restrictions on guns and stuff but we have a GOD also. Now add that to the pot with as many as, I'm guessing, 25 other Gods and we are in deep doo doo. Where did we get so many Gods from? We opened up something called immigration and started to let people in from all other parts of the world, and they brought in their Gods. We have Jewish Gods, Hindu Gods, Budda Gods, Muslim Gods, and who knows how many other Gods. The big problem now is all these guys we now elect to be President all promise they will unite us into one nation under God. Which God will prevail? Which God will it be? Will all the other Gods accept that God?....................I don't think so............... Now, the blues and the grays in the past have come together under one God during crisis, (like a war) but now there are 2 wars or 3 wars depending who is defining war and the grays and the blues are still bickering over minor things. You would think that this would bring the blues and the grays together faster but now they fight over stuff like spending to much money and not spending enough money. The grays say the blues spend to much money but they want to keep safe and they say finish the war and give the people back some money. Don't they know it costs money to have a war? The blues say the people should give more money so we can afford the war and make our people safe. That leaves me to believe that we will not use guns and stuff in the war between the grays and blues...................just a war of words...... no money left to pay for the guns.
1/10/10
SAS---SEATTLE, A NEW ENCOUNTER
We had only been in Seattle, for a short period of time when one day the phone rang. I picked it up and in my usual fantastically welcoming voice announced "SAS may I help you" the voice at the other end introduced himself as a Scandinavian Consulate calling to advise that the Princess was recently on a state visit in Vancouver BC and would be driving down to Seattle to board our flight to Copenhagen. Royalty?? just at the sound of the word my heart started beating a mile a minute, OH God, what do I do? what do I say? do I curtsy or do I bow? Do I offer my hand? do I wear gloves? He went on to tell me he was on his way out to the airport to meet with me and brief me to her needs. An hour later, the consulate was sitting in my office and we had gone over the plans and was advised on protocol. My job was quite easy from the sound of things and I was raring to go. She was being driven to Seattle by limousine, met at the Canadian - US Peace Arch and escorted by the Washington State Patrol. I would get a call when the WSP entered Seattle which would give me some time to position myself. I was to stand out on Pac-Hwy in front of the Hilton Hotel. The Princess was pre-checked in and would not go to the reception desk, but go directly to her room in the rear portion of the hotel for a short rest and to freshen up. As soon as I see the WSP lead car I was to identify myself to them by waving my arm. The lead car would then stop, pick me up and I would lead them to the rear of the building. I was then suppose to get out of the WSP car and immediately go to the limousine where at soon as it stop, open the rear door on the side the princess was sitting, bow from the waist, offer my hand to hold her arm as she got out, never looking at her legs. Never speak unless she speaks first. Escort her to the consulate and then complete the duties to arrange to have her bags taken to the airport. Wellllllllllll........everything was as planned except for the part where I was to jump into the lead WSP car. I was on Pac-Hwy, saw the flashing red and blue lights of the lead car, my heart immediately reached 100 pumps per minute. The lead car approached and began to slow down, I thought this was my signal, I reached for the door handle but it was locked, the car was just slowing for a small speed bump in the drive. I found myself running after the lead car waving my hand for him to stop. Needless to say, he did not stop until the door at the rear of the building showed up. Thirty seconds later I came to a huffing, puffing stop at the rear door of the limousine, but I was not to be thrown off my duties. I opened the door, bowed from the waist or was I just leaning over trying to catch my breath, can't remember exactly. At any rate my eyes went directly to her legs as she moved them to the outside of the limousine. She did speak, "hello" my immediate reaction was "Hi" . Guess I lucked out there, she was a young, modern western type lady otherwise I probably would have been beheaded right there on the spot . She asked if I was OK and how rude it was for the lead car to ignore me. Well, anyway, it turned out OK. Later that evening she was brought to the airport by the WSP and the consulate and brought directly to our lounge area. I did make a better impression, on my home turf where I was in charge. Your highness, it was a pleasure, to serve you. Please visit again.
When, SAS, first decided to service SeaTac International airport in Seattle, I was selected to head up the passenger service end of the airport staff. It was arranged that I would come out to Seattle from New York two months in advance to assist in opening the airport facilities, along with another person in a higher management position. We had already selected the staff we wanted out here and they were to make their way out the middle of August 1966 in time for a Sept 2nd inaugural flight. Due to the scheduling of the aircraft, it was determined that we would have to work a minimum of 13 hours a day for 3 days a week, which never actually worked out. My schedule ended up as working 52 consecutive days before my first day off. Personnel, back in New York was up in arms along with payroll over this stretch. Anyway, since most of the day was spent waiting for the aircraft to return from Los Angeles back to Seattle before heading over the pond, we found the time to visit the restaurant for 4 or 5 cups of coffee and a sandwich. In those days, the most inexpensive sandwich on the menu was a lettuce,tomato, mayo sandwich for $2.75. One of our alert staff discovered that every sandwich served in the restaurant always had some lettuce and a few cherry tomatoes on each plate. SSSSSOOOOOO one day he order a mayonnaise sandwich. This stumped the waitress but keeping with the "we satisfy" slogan she asked him exactly what that was. Much to everyone surprise at the table, his immediate respond was," two slices of white bread with mayonnaise spread on them" She was unable to give an exact price but agreed to .25 cents. He also asked for a hot cup of water. She never caught on to that one. Out came his order. Now it was time to prepare his lunch. Into the hot cup of water went some ketchup from the table, little salt and pepper and WHALLA!! tomato soup, now the best part. Indeed the mayonnaise sandwich came with some lettuce and 3 cherry tomato's on the side. Guess it was there just to fill up the plate. At the flick of the eye, the lettuce ended up on one slice of bread with the 3 cherry tomato's sliced up and spread out. A perfect lettuce and tomato sandwich for .25 cents. Savings $2.50 x 7 total $17.50 per week. The cost of 2 cases of beer for the week end. The down point, came some weeks later when the assistant manager, a real nice Danish guy sat down at our table and began talking with us (we had all become very good friends) and as the bills were distributed, he announced that this meal was on him. Much to his surprise, we were eating much to good for such a small amount. Next day, much to OUR surprise written in long hand "Mayonnaise sandwich............$2.75..........." just goes to show how all good things come to a quick ending.
THE FAMILY VICTORY GARDEN
The year was perhaps 1945/1946. The war had just ended and my uncles were all home from the service, but nothing had really changed as far as our family was concerned. All the families would spend the week days together but always kept in touch with one in other. A day would not go by without a telephone call between all the sisters and grandma. Grandma didn't speak much English but there was just something about her that you knew what she was saying. Saturdays, were the beginning of the weekend and most families spent that day shopping and doing family things together...........Saturday night was considered the night on the town, dad would end up playing penny anty poker with some of my uncles and it was mom's or the hostess of the house job to keep the sandwiches, beer and snacks coming. Sunday was typically the day when after church, we would stop at Wall's bakery and get fresh rolls, head home for a great breakfast of bacon,eggs and rolls with butter. Afternoons were a different story altogether. Springtime Sundays was garden building days at Grandma and Grandpa's. All, without exception, families were summoned with tools in hand to Grandma and Grandpa's house to build the family victory garden on a portion of their yard, which to me was tremendous even though it was right in the middle of a neighborhood. Seems like Grandpa, being in real estate struck a good deal with someone and bought several adjoining building lots. The main house and garage was on one, peach, apple, grape vines and fig trees on another and a giant victory garden on the third. The site of all these men arriving always reminded me of the seven dwarfs with their hoes,shovels,rakes etc over their shoulders. The plan was set out and to work, to work they went. The garden had to be completed in that one day and to celebrate Grandma and the ladies would cook the dinner. The idea of the garden was that everyone would work on it , everyone would reap its wealth.
Now , this was a special dinner from all the other Sundays, which was always pasta and wine. This dinner was Italian chicken, Italian sausage, Italian ham, Italian home grown potatoes, Italian beans and just about anything else you wanted, just as long as it was Italian.................plus plenty of Grandpa's home made Italian wine from the basement. Meanwhile it was a day of fun and exploring for the cousins. My cousin, Roberto, and I discovered a b b gun down in the basement that belonged to my uncle. Also, I'm not quite sure of where he got some great balloons but not like regular balloons, they seems to have a larger opening where you would blow them up , but we just filled them up with water which stretched them out to about a foot long, nailed them to a beam and shot b.b.s at them until we either got caught or ran out of b.bs.
There was cousin Roberto, his sister we'll call "R" and myself that hung out the most at family gatherings, I think it was because of the closeness of our age. Roberto and I were constantly getting into little trouble deals, nothing vicious, just being pain the the butt. One Uncle had a little vespa type motor bike, that we would love to ride. Neither of us were old enough or really able to control the speed or direction. We would just like to get on this thing and ride it in and out of Grandpa's mini peach tree orchard, digging up whatever grass was still there by doing our wheelies. Many a tree was bumped into, which aggravated grandpa to no end. He would get a switch branch off the lilac bush strip off its leaves and come chasing after us swinging the branch over his head. OH, if he had ever caught us. We would just drop the scooter and tear out of there, teasing him to come and get us. After giving him a half hour or so to relax and calm down, we would both approach him and sit on his lap and give him the sad look and "I'm sorry grandpa" and all was soon forgotten, ................until next time................
At grandma and grandpa's house for each Sundays dinner, due to the size of the family, all the adults were seated together at one table, all the children at another. It seemed to me that everyone had their special seat starting from grandpa who had the head of the table from there and to his right was oldest son, his wife, oldest daughter,her husband etc. Grandma, the last person seated was at the opposite end of the table. Kids table, totally unorganized and always a fight who was sitting next to who. The mothers would feed us on smaller plates before sitting at the big people table and only the things she knew we would finish eating. Grandma did not like left overs. If it wasn't enough for us we would find ways to get food off the other cousins plate or perhaps trade......2 green beans for a small sausage.......... If it did happen and I say "IF" that there was food left over, there was always a dog that would help you finish. I had an uncle that was in charge of exercising the dog. He would put the dog in the basement and find a stray cat to keep the dog company for a while. Now, before I hear any comments about animal abuse, save it!!!!! the dog never caught the cat, it was only meant to keep his heart pumping.
What fun days and never a dull moment. It seemed like we were never bored, always something to do.
Now , this was a special dinner from all the other Sundays, which was always pasta and wine. This dinner was Italian chicken, Italian sausage, Italian ham, Italian home grown potatoes, Italian beans and just about anything else you wanted, just as long as it was Italian.................plus plenty of Grandpa's home made Italian wine from the basement. Meanwhile it was a day of fun and exploring for the cousins. My cousin, Roberto, and I discovered a b b gun down in the basement that belonged to my uncle. Also, I'm not quite sure of where he got some great balloons but not like regular balloons, they seems to have a larger opening where you would blow them up , but we just filled them up with water which stretched them out to about a foot long, nailed them to a beam and shot b.b.s at them until we either got caught or ran out of b.bs.
There was cousin Roberto, his sister we'll call "R" and myself that hung out the most at family gatherings, I think it was because of the closeness of our age. Roberto and I were constantly getting into little trouble deals, nothing vicious, just being pain the the butt. One Uncle had a little vespa type motor bike, that we would love to ride. Neither of us were old enough or really able to control the speed or direction. We would just like to get on this thing and ride it in and out of Grandpa's mini peach tree orchard, digging up whatever grass was still there by doing our wheelies. Many a tree was bumped into, which aggravated grandpa to no end. He would get a switch branch off the lilac bush strip off its leaves and come chasing after us swinging the branch over his head. OH, if he had ever caught us. We would just drop the scooter and tear out of there, teasing him to come and get us. After giving him a half hour or so to relax and calm down, we would both approach him and sit on his lap and give him the sad look and "I'm sorry grandpa" and all was soon forgotten, ................until next time................
At grandma and grandpa's house for each Sundays dinner, due to the size of the family, all the adults were seated together at one table, all the children at another. It seemed to me that everyone had their special seat starting from grandpa who had the head of the table from there and to his right was oldest son, his wife, oldest daughter,her husband etc. Grandma, the last person seated was at the opposite end of the table. Kids table, totally unorganized and always a fight who was sitting next to who. The mothers would feed us on smaller plates before sitting at the big people table and only the things she knew we would finish eating. Grandma did not like left overs. If it wasn't enough for us we would find ways to get food off the other cousins plate or perhaps trade......2 green beans for a small sausage.......... If it did happen and I say "IF" that there was food left over, there was always a dog that would help you finish. I had an uncle that was in charge of exercising the dog. He would put the dog in the basement and find a stray cat to keep the dog company for a while. Now, before I hear any comments about animal abuse, save it!!!!! the dog never caught the cat, it was only meant to keep his heart pumping.
What fun days and never a dull moment. It seemed like we were never bored, always something to do.
1/9/10
A SENIOR'S VIEW OF THE NEW TECHNOLOGY
I have been thinking recently about the 38 years I spent on the job, before retirement. I rose from the cellars of mail boy to the height of what some considered middle management or what I considered lower management. It seems that the correct definition of the position lies in only ones mind. During these years I've watched how management worked and with what machines they brought to the job. At first when the fax machine came out, it was a marvel never seen before..."how did we ever live without this phenomenon" to have a piece of paper transmitted over thin wires to another machine and show up in perfect duplicate. The cell phone was another. I remember seeing men carry this around in a bag hung over their shoulders, what an advancement. Just prior to this only a select few, mainly the rich, had them in their cars. Now, even the street people and children as young as 5 walk around with this instrument glued to their ear. OOHHH how far we have come. I spent 38 years without a blackberry that played music, took videos, pictures and communicated with the world over something called facebook and twitter and work just went on. Now my grandchildren can twix, and text me faster than I can think.
A while ago, a high school classmate of mine emailed me and told me how awesome it would be if I joined facebook along with a whole bunch of other classmates. "Just think, how it could bring all of us closer" was the inducement I needed. SSSSOOOOOO facebook it was, then before you knew it, Twitter started to be mentioned. Just think now you can Tweeter,Tweetree,Twhirl,Twitterfon,Tweetie and Twittererific, Tweetdeck, Twitpix and something that sends every message including bowel movements of the next generation to my cell phone and every other program in the texting world. Now I carry my cell phone around clipped to my belt for security, and every three minutes or so, I find myself hunched over pulling on my pants to try and get closer to the phone simply because I am unable to get the phone off my belt fast enough. People watching probably now think I am not only old but retarded.
Two years ago, my kids bought me a GPS for my birthday. They say I could get lost every now and then going across the street to get the mail. Little did they know, I was out there just BSing with the other people getting the mail.. this is really a cool gadget and it looks really great on my dash board, but the lady inside is the most annoying,rudest person I had run into in a long time. Every 10 minutes, she would sarcastically say, "RE-CALC-UL-ATING" You would think she could be nicer. It was as if she could barely tolerate me. She would let go with a deep sigh and then tell me to make a U-turn at the next light. Then when I would make a right turn instead, it was not a good thing!!!. When I really get lost, I call my wife and tell her the name of the cross streets and while she is starting to develop the same tone as Gypsy, the GPS lady, I at least know she cares for me. I tried to use this GPS once to see just how it worked. I hooked it up and told it that I wanted to go to the mailbox. In the time it took just to locate where I was at that moment, I had backed out of my driveway, pulled up to the mailbox, reached in and got the mail, closed the window and was back into my drive way. I even helped it along by telling it I did not want to take any highways. A time saver it's not...........
Cordless phones are another great thing, now one can walk around the house talking on the phone, the only drawback is that I have not yet figured out that when I hear the little beep tone how do I put one call on hold, answer the other call, and then return to the first person. I always find myself having to call the first person back.
The world is just moving to fast for me. They even mess me up at the grocery store. You would think they could settle on something themselves but this sudden "Paper or Plastic?" every time I check out just knocks me for a loop. I bought some of those cloth reusable bags to avoid looking confused but I never can remember to take them in with me. When they ask me, "Paper of Plastic?" I just say, "doesn't matter to me I am bi-sacksual" then it's their turn to stare at me with a blank look.
Whats next in this world???
A while ago, a high school classmate of mine emailed me and told me how awesome it would be if I joined facebook along with a whole bunch of other classmates. "Just think, how it could bring all of us closer" was the inducement I needed. SSSSOOOOOO facebook it was, then before you knew it, Twitter started to be mentioned. Just think now you can Tweeter,Tweetree,Twhirl,Twitterfon,Tweetie and Twittererific, Tweetdeck, Twitpix and something that sends every message including bowel movements of the next generation to my cell phone and every other program in the texting world. Now I carry my cell phone around clipped to my belt for security, and every three minutes or so, I find myself hunched over pulling on my pants to try and get closer to the phone simply because I am unable to get the phone off my belt fast enough. People watching probably now think I am not only old but retarded.
Two years ago, my kids bought me a GPS for my birthday. They say I could get lost every now and then going across the street to get the mail. Little did they know, I was out there just BSing with the other people getting the mail.. this is really a cool gadget and it looks really great on my dash board, but the lady inside is the most annoying,rudest person I had run into in a long time. Every 10 minutes, she would sarcastically say, "RE-CALC-UL-ATING" You would think she could be nicer. It was as if she could barely tolerate me. She would let go with a deep sigh and then tell me to make a U-turn at the next light. Then when I would make a right turn instead, it was not a good thing!!!. When I really get lost, I call my wife and tell her the name of the cross streets and while she is starting to develop the same tone as Gypsy, the GPS lady, I at least know she cares for me. I tried to use this GPS once to see just how it worked. I hooked it up and told it that I wanted to go to the mailbox. In the time it took just to locate where I was at that moment, I had backed out of my driveway, pulled up to the mailbox, reached in and got the mail, closed the window and was back into my drive way. I even helped it along by telling it I did not want to take any highways. A time saver it's not...........
Cordless phones are another great thing, now one can walk around the house talking on the phone, the only drawback is that I have not yet figured out that when I hear the little beep tone how do I put one call on hold, answer the other call, and then return to the first person. I always find myself having to call the first person back.
The world is just moving to fast for me. They even mess me up at the grocery store. You would think they could settle on something themselves but this sudden "Paper or Plastic?" every time I check out just knocks me for a loop. I bought some of those cloth reusable bags to avoid looking confused but I never can remember to take them in with me. When they ask me, "Paper of Plastic?" I just say, "doesn't matter to me I am bi-sacksual" then it's their turn to stare at me with a blank look.
Whats next in this world???
1/4/10
My FATHER'S SON
When I think back in time, growing up in an Italian family was very rewarding. Growing up in an Italian family where I was the son, was very,very rewarding. Growing up in an Italian family where I was not only the only son but the only CHILD, was downright awesome. Does this make me sound spoiled? When, I look back, all of my fathers' and mothers' brothers and sisters married and had at least 3 kids in each family. On my mothers side alone my grandparents had 52 grandchildren by the time I was 16 and I, was the oldest grandchild. I simply loss count after that. I have got 2nd cousins, that I don't even know. This to me is mind boggling but what a great time to grow up. Sure, my dad had some real quirks, that I still remember like it was happening today, but when he spoke I listened. Much can be said about that in today's world. Growing up was constantly a learning period. He spoke like a priest, "Do as I say, don't do as I do", "A politician is like a used car salesman, they will only tell you what they want you to know", "Lawyers are made, not only to protect the innocent, but anyone else that will pay them""Do unto others, as you wish them to do under you" or was it unto you, I forget. Amazing, the words rolled off his lips and they live with me today. "Never use the car defroster to take away fogged windows, carry a rag in the glove box for that, using the defroster takes away the power of the engine" wha????? "Not necessary to use chains on your tires in a winter snow. Just put 80 lbs. of sandbags in the trunk over each rear wheel, chains will only rip up the fenders" "Don't put your skis on facing downhill" WWWHHHHOOOOOAAAAAAA. Pretty good advice coming from a man that always said "If God wanted me to ski, I would have been born with feet 6' long and toes that curled up in front"............"Never stop to talk to an angry dog RUN LIKE HELL!!!!!" I was constantly learning something, and many of those lessons are still with me today. You will never catch me putting skis on facing downhill.
I can't remember ever being spanked as some of my cousins were, after a simply lesson of respect to thy parents. Because I listened to both my parents. My mom once said, don't argue or talk back to dad if you see him starting to clinch his fist, that was a lesson that was once tried. I remember as a young guy of 8 years old, I wanted a pipe, like grandpa. My dad told me, he didn't have the money for it. I just could not let it go and played the role of a abused child, laying down on the floor in the tobacco shop, screaming bloody murder, while all the customers gave my dad dirty looks. My father simply lifted me up, kicking and screaming, and tried to explain that there just was no money for the pipe, but NNNOOOO, I didn't want to hear that. He tried everything nice, even trying to promise me an ice cream instead of the pipe. I didn't want to hear that either. He finally took my small hand into his hand and it felt like a closing vise was never ending, smiled at me and continued to squeeze until the hand no longer had feeling. When I saw that the other customers were falling for his kindness to this little screaming jackass, the tears stopped instantly, I got up ,brushed myself off, and walked out holding my dad's hand. That was the very last time I tried that stunt and always remembered what my mom had said. Always watch dad's hands and never argue or talk back if you see him starting to clinch his fist. I remembered what that hand felt like in the jaws of the vise. We'll hear more about mom and dad as time goes by.
I can't remember ever being spanked as some of my cousins were, after a simply lesson of respect to thy parents. Because I listened to both my parents. My mom once said, don't argue or talk back to dad if you see him starting to clinch his fist, that was a lesson that was once tried. I remember as a young guy of 8 years old, I wanted a pipe, like grandpa. My dad told me, he didn't have the money for it. I just could not let it go and played the role of a abused child, laying down on the floor in the tobacco shop, screaming bloody murder, while all the customers gave my dad dirty looks. My father simply lifted me up, kicking and screaming, and tried to explain that there just was no money for the pipe, but NNNOOOO, I didn't want to hear that. He tried everything nice, even trying to promise me an ice cream instead of the pipe. I didn't want to hear that either. He finally took my small hand into his hand and it felt like a closing vise was never ending, smiled at me and continued to squeeze until the hand no longer had feeling. When I saw that the other customers were falling for his kindness to this little screaming jackass, the tears stopped instantly, I got up ,brushed myself off, and walked out holding my dad's hand. That was the very last time I tried that stunt and always remembered what my mom had said. Always watch dad's hands and never argue or talk back if you see him starting to clinch his fist. I remembered what that hand felt like in the jaws of the vise. We'll hear more about mom and dad as time goes by.
1/2/10
NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS.....DO THEY EXIST?
Well, my friends, here we are once again. Standing on the threshold of---an old outgoing year, and the new incoming year. Oh, what a glorious day. To think it seems like just yesterday, when I resolved that during the new year of 2009, my ambition was to clean out my garage and get rid of all the junk that I have not used in the past 5 years, old skis, old leather ski boots, old rusted screws, bolts and nails that my father had collected, old water saturated insulation that I once told myself I would put around all the little holes I found around the house. Oh, to have those days and years back.
I remember, as if it were yesterday, that my New Years resolutions were dreams that went so unanswered. When I was 5, I resolved that, I would keep my room neat and clean, not!!, that lasted as long as the quarter a week allowance did, At 10, I resolved to become a better athlete and save my school from many losses it had, by becoming the hero. HA! ! The only part of me that completed that resolution was my feet, when I developed athlete's foot and spent a year spreading salve and powder on those beautiful tootsie, and the ego of wearing a jock strap three times the size needed. At 18 my resolution was to be accepted at Princeton Univ. and begin dating the most beautiful girl from the neighboring female school, YO, BRO!! can't quite remember if that was the year I went to THE New York school of Interior and architectural design-------or Webster school of Floral design, anyway this lead to my employment by SAS and my New Years resolution became more and more confined to how I would spend my time being more concerned about World Peace, authoring a tell all book on inside corporations and the people running them and finally Food and Beverages of the World and their effect on the aging. my food of choice becoming extra salted herring on pasta and aquavit, a smooth burning liquor that had the capabilities of removing the rust from my dad's collection of screws and bolts.
At any rate, tonight........12 hours away........I once again will be awaken from a sound sleep on the couch promptly at 11:45 By a beautiful blonde bombshell with an hour glass figure I remember from the 50's, to watch the little tinsel ball slipping down the shaft into the New Year of 2010. A cling of the glass of champagne, (or diet coke) a smile and a bird like peck for a kiss. Goodnight, my darling, I shall retire now to the comfort of my flannel sheets and hopefully awaken in the morning to begin my NEW ........New Years resolutions.
I think this year I will just make it easy on myself by not abusing me of always being a failure to keep these resolutions .........I will list two wishes in each of three categories. Category A----zero chance of completing, Category B, 50 % chance of completing and Category C.......I got it made!!!!!
Category A
1- Grow to the height of 7' and not loosing any weight become a force in Basketball and the highest scorer in history
2- stay at my 5'11" height loose 50 lbs and have the body of a 20 year old porn star.
Category B
1- Finish cleaning my garage
2- Having three of my neighborhood ladies invite me for tea and conversation on consecutive days each week
Category C
1-wash my face and hand once a day
2-listen to my wife,........the talking GPS...........driving directions.
Now, you may ask which one of these categories, I will complete, and even though all three are possible, Only one will have any chance in Hell of making.
Happy New Year my friends and may the year bring all resolutions into reality by reaching 20,000 on the stock exchange.
Vito
I remember, as if it were yesterday, that my New Years resolutions were dreams that went so unanswered. When I was 5, I resolved that, I would keep my room neat and clean, not!!, that lasted as long as the quarter a week allowance did, At 10, I resolved to become a better athlete and save my school from many losses it had, by becoming the hero. HA! ! The only part of me that completed that resolution was my feet, when I developed athlete's foot and spent a year spreading salve and powder on those beautiful tootsie, and the ego of wearing a jock strap three times the size needed. At 18 my resolution was to be accepted at Princeton Univ. and begin dating the most beautiful girl from the neighboring female school, YO, BRO!! can't quite remember if that was the year I went to THE New York school of Interior and architectural design-------or Webster school of Floral design, anyway this lead to my employment by SAS and my New Years resolution became more and more confined to how I would spend my time being more concerned about World Peace, authoring a tell all book on inside corporations and the people running them and finally Food and Beverages of the World and their effect on the aging. my food of choice becoming extra salted herring on pasta and aquavit, a smooth burning liquor that had the capabilities of removing the rust from my dad's collection of screws and bolts.
At any rate, tonight........12 hours away........I once again will be awaken from a sound sleep on the couch promptly at 11:45 By a beautiful blonde bombshell with an hour glass figure I remember from the 50's, to watch the little tinsel ball slipping down the shaft into the New Year of 2010. A cling of the glass of champagne, (or diet coke) a smile and a bird like peck for a kiss. Goodnight, my darling, I shall retire now to the comfort of my flannel sheets and hopefully awaken in the morning to begin my NEW ........New Years resolutions.
I think this year I will just make it easy on myself by not abusing me of always being a failure to keep these resolutions .........I will list two wishes in each of three categories. Category A----zero chance of completing, Category B, 50 % chance of completing and Category C.......I got it made!!!!!
Category A
1- Grow to the height of 7' and not loosing any weight become a force in Basketball and the highest scorer in history
2- stay at my 5'11" height loose 50 lbs and have the body of a 20 year old porn star.
Category B
1- Finish cleaning my garage
2- Having three of my neighborhood ladies invite me for tea and conversation on consecutive days each week
Category C
1-wash my face and hand once a day
2-listen to my wife,........the talking GPS...........driving directions.
Now, you may ask which one of these categories, I will complete, and even though all three are possible, Only one will have any chance in Hell of making.
Happy New Year my friends and may the year bring all resolutions into reality by reaching 20,000 on the stock exchange.
Vito
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